Endgame Viable

I’ve been thinking about character names. Normally I make up new names for all my characters, but I know a lot of people carry over their names from one game to another. You always see people trying “get their names” when a new game launches. One day on a whim I decided to re-use a couple of names from Rift characters for some EQ2 alts to see what it was like, and I found it very weird. (149 words.)

I did something odd over one weekend. I installed and played both Everquest and Asheron’s Call for a little while. Everquest is free-to-play now, if you didn’t know. You can download the client and log right on in there, and there are a surprising number of people who apparently do just that. The little newbie cave must have had a dozen people in it wandering around trying to figure out how to play. (608 words.)

I’ve always wondered something. Most of the world uses WASD for their keyboard controls, right? I’m assuming so because that’s how every game is pre-configured. I, however, use ESDF for my keyboard controls, so I have to change the defaults on every single game I play. I am not bitter about that. Mostly. I chose ESDF when I re-did my Quake keyboard binds way back in the day because it seemed like the natural choice, because my ring finger, middle finger, and index finger naturally rested on SDF anyway. If I needed to type a quick message, my fingers were right there ready to do so. (227 words.)

Over the holiday weekend I started a new Twitch channel for EndgameViable, because I like to do weird stuff like broadcast my gaming sessions for the entire world to see. Plus, all the kids are doing it. (Actually I’m not sure if I like it or not, but I like it when other people do it.) So yeah, tune in and watch me play games you’ve already seen before! Follow @endgameviable on Twitter and you’ll get an obnoxious tweet every time I go live. (316 words.)

This is an example of how to make nanowrimo harder. I won NaNoWriMo, barely. Scrivener said I had 50,140 words, but NaNoWriMo only gave me credit for 50,005 words, which I turned in on the night of the 30th. You might be surprised to know that I actually did “end” the story as well. I didn’t just stop writing. (997 words.)

One night I didn’t feel like playing an MMO. It happened to be a night where there was a Steam sale on Stanley’s Parable, a game I’ve heard a lot about, so I got that and played it. First of all, it’s not a game. There needs to be another category for this kind of thing. Something like Interactive Art Project or Interactive Entertainment. (It’s similar to Gone Home in that regard.) Stanley’s Parable is like a point-and-click Adventure game I suppose, but it’s not quite the same because there aren’t really any puzzles to solve. It’s something you are just supposed to view and experience, not “play.” (124 words.)

In playing Aion again, I made a shocking* discovery: It’s open world PvP! I had no idea. I always thought the PvP was voluntary. But nope, I found out the hard way when I was out in Morheim. I got killed by some guy on a skateboard in like four shots. I didn’t even realize it was another player until I was almost dead. Well that sure puts a new spin on things. (262 words.)

When I last left LotRO (Lord of the Rings Online) a couple of years ago, my highest level character was only a level 38 Hunter. I stopped playing largely because of this one Epic quest that kept defeating me, and nothing will drive me away from a game faster than a required quest that keeps killing me and/or requires a group. I discussed that quest in another post. When I came back this time, I got past that quest, so progression could resume. (822 words.)

Has anyone seen Wizardry Online? It’s free-to-play, and another one of those hardcore old school MMORPGs that SOE seems to like. It’s clearly Asian in origin, but it’s weird because it’s an Asian vision of standard European medieval tropes like elves and dwarves. The graphics are odd as well. It looks a bit like everything is a low-contrast sepia-toned image. WO seems to be one of the “hard” MMOs that everyone clamors for (but never actually plays). Some games are hard now simply because the controls are foreign (like EQ and AC-playing those two now is like trying to type on a Dvorak keyboard). WO is hard even with a modernized input system. There are no (well, few) sparklies showing you where to go. Supposedly it is permanent death if you die. (I haven’t died yet to test that out.) Supposedly it is open world PvP and anyone can PK you. (I haven’t encountered any PKs yet.) It’s got an odd combat system where you lock onto targets to fight with them (it’s a bit like Dark Souls if you’ve played that). There’s no renewal of health or mana so you have to drink potions or cast spells to heal. It’s got very limited inventory so you have to really choose your equipment wisely (things that you wear still take up space in your backpack, a super old school concept). You can’t see how tough monsters are until you fight them. You have to identify magic items to see what they are, and you have to go back a place to level up after you’ve gained enough experience. It’s … you know, hard. (361 words.)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! No posts until Monday. Have a great weekend! (11 words.)